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Police: Woman holds on to car as thief drives away

MELBOURNE, Fla. — Melbourne police are trying to identify a man they said stole a woman’s car when she walked into a convenience store.

Police said she left her keys in the car, and that’s all the opportunity the thief needed.

Police said the victim was still holding on to her car as the thief pulled out of a parking lot and onto Babcock Street.

Melbourne police released surveillance video of the bold car thief.

The man can be seen walking up to the woman’s gold Chevy Cavalier and getting inside to grab the keys.

The woman sees the thief and appears to call for help as the man starts driving away with the woman still hanging on.

“Luckily, no one got hurt in this incident, the owner did get dragged a little bit, but she got lucky and got away with some very minor injuries,” said Cmdr. Sean Riordan of the Melbourne Police Department.

But police have not found the car thief or the woman’s vehicle.

“We were following on some leads. We thought we had him identified. However, after a couple of days we realized it was the wrong person,” said Riordan. “We're asking people to look if there are any vehicles out there that resemble this car that have been there for a while.”

The license plate on that stolen car is 012-1BY.